Back to World of Blogging!

Goodness! Time has sure flown by since my last post back in OCTOBER of last year. I guess planning a wedding, working, and going to school took me away more than I thought. So much has changed since then and I can't wait to share it all with you!

Luke and I were married on May 14th of this year. It was the most perfect day and we were so blessed to have so many of our family and friends there with us. We celebrated our special day on our Alma Mater, King College's, campus. That's where we met, so we felt it appropriate to end one chapter and start the next. God even blessed us with an absolutely beautiful rainbow above the chapel, just minutes before I walked down the aisle. Perfection!

Just nine days before the big day though, I was celebrating another very special day. I was finally getting "pinned" as a BSN nurse. To most of us in the nursing world, our pinning ceremony is not only a rite of passage, but also more important than our actual graduation. It's a special evening just for us and to really focus on our hard work and accomplishments throughout our years in nursing school. It's the evening we wait so impatiently for and then cannot believe how quickly it has arrived.

Each of us with our black dresses or suits, high heels, perfect hair, and a very special little piece of jewelry to commerorate our hard work and dedication to the world of nursing; it meant everything to me. And to top it all off, it was held in the most beautiful and amazing place; our sister church, First Presbyterian Church. It edges the top-end of our campus, crowning King with an even greater presence of Christ as our center. For such a special night and such a memorable moment, it was the perfect place to celebrate what God had blessed each and every one of us with. Unfortunately though, that's where the happiness ends until the wedding.

That evening, as my family and I celebrated at dinner out-on-the-town, I began to feel terrible from head to toe. Luke took me home early while everyone else finished their supper, hoping that it was just a 12-24 hour bug. Nope. Whatever this was took hold and wouldn't release until Sunday morning. I was admitted to the hospital in Bristol that evening, missing both baccalaureate and graduation. It was the most humbling and heartbreaking moment I had had in a very long time. Not only was I missing my moment on stage, but all of my friends and Luke who had worked so hard to become part of a minority group of college graduates. Sweetly and sadly, my mother called just before Luke walked across stage so I could be part of it from the other side of town.

In the weeks following, I've had my moments where I have wondered why I got sick right before the day I had struggled to get to. It hit me just recently the real reason. I wasn't focusing on God; I was focusing on me. I needed to step back and remember how great and mighty the Lord really is, controlling all situations in life. I could have been angry and I was for a while, but then I remembered that I didn't become a nurse for me, I became a nurse for Him. I am His child and His servent. I didn't need thirty seconds on a stage to make me who I am, I needed and always will each and every moment with God.

His love and plans for me are greater than anything I could ever imagine, even if that means I miss a day that I thought was oh-so-important. Yes, it would have been nice to have seen my now-husband walk across that stage and celebrate with all of my friends, but almost immediately after the ceremony was over my room flooded with all of the people I love and adore. It was such a blessing! To each of you that called, came by, sent flowers, cards and gifts... THANK YOU!!! I love you all!

Since then I have been 100% healthy and have been cleared by my physician. The final diagnosis was "infection and increased white blood cell count of unknown origin, related to extreme amounts of stress"... otherwise known as "a wake-up call to slow down". It's never been something I've been good at, but I'm learning each and every day to slow down and let God lead. Nothing is ever successful unless God is in control; believe me I know.

On June 1st Luke and I, along with our parents and new puppy Lilly, made the ten hour journey to Oxford, Mississippi. Boy were we in for a surprise! HOT HOT HOT is the temperature down here and with little relief. We've had some good storms, but not enough to keep us out of the high 90's and 100's. Our parent's left just a few days after getting us settled in and talk about difficult to say "goodbye". I think I cried for a week straight, but since then have become accustom to the distance and no longer take for granted to phone calls and conversations we have with one another.

We truly love it here in Oxford and hope to make this our permanent home. We have found an amazing church, have met some amazing Christian friends, and are excited about the adventures to come within our lives. Luke starts law school at Ole Miss next week and football season is just around the corner. So many fun times are ahead of us and we can't wait to share our stories more with each of you. For now, I will end my extremely lengthy post and pray that each of you have a safe and blessed day!